Epilogue
by fireun
Summary: NarutoSasukeNaruto. a coming home, of sorts, for Uchiha Sasuke. and the resulting fallout.


It started where it had ended, two predators circling each other warily looking for an opportunity if not an opening. They took in each other's differences with narrowed eyes, more than half distracted by what they remembered. They looked for patterns to fall into and onto, settling on an aggression that was as much self defense as offense. Naruto didn't notice his upper lip had curled up just so. Sasuke didn't realize he hadn't dared blink. But each noticed the others reflexive defense and interpreted it as offense. Old habits died hard, and reared again in the face of familiar stimuli.

Too long apart, neither of them wanted to make the first move, to be the one to try and test the other. There was enough difference in Naruto's bearing, in Sasuke's movements, that neither was sure of the other.

Impulsive, compulsive, Naruto made the first move. He straightened, and if he didn't exactly smile some of the snarl left his face. "I'm hungry. Let's get lunch."

No one breathed a sigh of relief, not exactly, but as Naruto moved aside to allow Sasuke and his captors turned escort to enter Konoha, white knuckled grips were relaxed, kunai were replaced into holsters, scrolls slipped back into cases and hidden pockets.

Uchiha Sasuke had returned.

Sasuke bristled the first time he overheard someone refer to him as 'Uzumaki's problem'. Offhand disdain, a neglectful disrespect, the tone of the voices drifting through the open window implied he was some manner of unpleasant stray that someone had to account for.

It was utterly backwards. Naruto was the stray those sneers should be directed towards. Naturo was the one who should be avoided, looks averted.

But Sasuke was the one settled in a room that was pretending prettily to be something other than a cell, playing at reading and ignoring the ANBU settled rather obviously nearby. Distrusted, assumed to be rather disturbed, Sasuke enjoyed his long leash courtesy of one Uzumaki Naruto, who was more than willing to vouch for his errant team member's conduct with a snort and something resembling the tortured cousin of a proper smile. Of course Sasuke would behave. And if he didn't, well, Naruto would deal with it.

Uzumaki's problem.

Sasuke's displeasure melted into a manic sort of amusement. The world had somersaulted, shifting everything out of place, but Naruto still had his hands in every bit of trouble available. His face dropped to his hands, reading material forgotten as he started to laugh. It was a bitter, rasping sound, and most likely didn't do anything to assure his guard dogs he was the stable pillar of society he pretended to be when Naruto was around.

When Naruto was around, those sporadic bits of time between missions and epic adventures involving terrorizing one eating establishment or another with his comrades and companions, when he would flop himself onto the battered sofa, feet dirty and hair mussed. When Naruto would tweak an eyebrow upwards in a gesture picked up from an innocently inquisitive Kakashi. Naruto, Konoha's reject-turned-shinobi, eyeing his 'problem'.

The little quirks might be borrowed, but the attitude was all Uzumaki Naruto. There was an irrepressible bit of humor, though how the blond managed to find anything funny in their current situation baffled Sasuke. There was a distinct lack of formality.

And a rather pointed bit of territorial ferocity.

Sasuke assumed Naruto was determined to protect the village from him.

What he hadn't counted on was Naruto's determination to protect him from the village.

Quiet displeasure and disdain sometimes sublimated to a more tangible bit of threat. The first time a snarling Naruto materialized between Sasuke and his would be tormentors, Sasuke managed not to flinch merely by virtue of familiarity with Naruto's roiling chakra. Naruto looked very much the feral, hair a haphazard flurry of spikes and eyes blazing. There was an unsteady moment when the idiots hesitated to back down, but as soon as Naruto's posture took a more aggressive air, they made do with some disparaging comments and tried to pretend they weren't running. The bit of red that caught the light in Naruto's eyes proved their decision to be a sound one.

Sasuke opened his mouth to utter some bland comment or another, but the words were knocked away by the unfamiliar feel of Naruto's mouth pressing against his.

Sasuke was pretty sure his ANBU guards were scandalized.

The glare Naruto leveled at him before stalking off assured Sasuke that Naruto didn't care.

It wasn't too much longer before the ANBU themselves vanished. Sasuke had proven to be a rather boring surveillance subject, prone to doing little more than read, sleep, and train when the mood struck him and Naruto was willing to spar.

Sasuke privately assumed that the ANBU had simply gotten tired of that instant when fighting sublimated into fucking. Naruto had an odd temper and Sasuke a rather abrasive temperament. It made for an interesting study in association.

Sasuke was restless. Naruto had turned out to be quite the shinobi, and as a result was often off on one mission or another, leaving his charge to fend for himself. Sasuke would stalk through Konoha like a haunting. The last Uchiha, fallen from grace and carefully avoided by everyone he approached. He took to wandering the old Uchiha compound, a slightly more tangible specter amidst the spiderwebs and rodents that now occupied the once proud structures.

He had spent his entire life trying to be good enough.

He walked barefoot through the rooms still decorated with faded bloodstains and for once didn't flinch.

Konoha had moved on. It barely noticed its Uchiha ghosts anymore.

Naruto came back from missions smelling like blood, sweat, and a fascinating mix of sand, salt, and pollen; like he had rolled all around the world outside of Konoha just to bring some of it back for his little problem. Naruto's eternally wind mussed hair was perfectly suited to catching every scent, from the mossy bit of ground he had slept on the night before to the pine tree that had dropped a bit of sap down the back of his neck. Sasuke made a point of brushing close to catch those smells and the places they described before Naruto made it to the shower.

Naruto would hold still, not quite used to a Sasuke that initiated any sort of contact and trying to sort out whether he minded or not.

In the end he never minded. And showers were always delayed.

It ended where it had began, two outcasts not quite sure of each other, but awkwardly certain that they didn't want to be alone.


End file.
